Peanut butter is a popular, highly nutritious food prepared by shelling, roasting, and, preferably, blanching peanuts before grinding them to a uniform creamy consistency. Certain optional ingredients are generally added to the ground peanuts, such as a sweetener, salt, and hydrogenated vegetable oil. The hydrogenated vegetable oil is a stabilizer added to most commercial peanut butters to prevent separation of an oil phase. Such peanut butters require the additional processing steps of mixing the finely ground peanuts while hot with the stabilizer and the sugar and salt, if added, and then cooling the mixture by passing it through a heat exchanger to obtain a material which solidifies shortly after filling into jars to the typical peanut butter consistency.
To be labelled a "peanut butter" under the applicable regulations of the Food and Drug Administration, the peanut ingredients must comprise at least 90% of the weight of the finished product, 21 CFR Section 164.150. If more than 10% of the peanut product consists of nonpeanut ingredients, then the product is termed a "peanut spread," 21 CFR Section 102.23(a), so long as it meets all of the conditions set forth in 21 CFR Section 102.23(b) to be considered nutritionally equivalent to peanut butter. However, if the peanut spread is nutritionally inferior to peanut butter, then it must be labelled an "imitation peanut butter," 21 CFR Section 102.23(b). "Crunchy" peanut butters contain substantial added quantities of peanut fragments. When only peanuts, sugar and salt are used, the peanut butter is generally designated as a "Natural" or "Old-Fashioned" peanut butter. The term "peanut butter product" as used herein is intended to include peanut butters, peanut spreads, and imitation peanut butters, whether creamy, crunchy, old-fashioned, or natural.
Peanut butter is a highly nutritious food containing high levels of protein. However, peanut butter also contains relatively large quantities of fat. Thus, peanut butter's appeal as a protein source is offset by its high calorie content, i.e., about 592 calories per one hundred grams. The commercial attractiveness of a reduced calorie peanut butter product has long been recognized by the industry since reducing one's calorie intake generally would be desirable and beneficial to the consumer. However, even though the fat in peanut butter comprises about 72% of its total calories, only a limited reduction in calories can be obtained by reducing the percentage of fat. For example, even if all of the fat was eliminated, the calorie content of the carbohydrates and protein therein results in a total reduction in calories of about 43%. Moreover, if more than about 50% of the fat in peanut butter is removed, the resulting product becomes very stiff. Upon further removal of fat, the peanut butter product is no longer a paste but becomes a powder. Since a fat content of 35% corresponds to only about a 14 % reduction in calories per gram, it can be seen that substituting even moderate calorie-containing materials, such as partially defatted peanuts or low or no fat peanut flour, for the fat content above 35% provides only a very modest decrease in the calorie content of such peanut butter products. Moreover, this modest reduction is achieved at the expense of extensive additional processing and a stiffer, more adhesive product.
One of the most common methods for effectively decreasing the amount of calories per unit volume in a food product is the addition of water as a non-calorie ingredient together with a thickener or emulsifier to duplicate the texture of the original product. However, water adversely affects the flavor, color, texture and mouthfeel of peanut butter products. In addition, unlike peanut butter which is microbiologically stable at room temperature because it is a fat-based food product containing very small quantities of water, generally about 1-2% by weight, and has a low level of water activity, water-based products generally must be refrigerated after opening or contain preservatives to retard spoilage. Although many other methods of reducing calories in water-based foods are known, such methods are also not acceptable for fat-based food products such as peanut butter.
An alternate approach that has been tried to reduce the amount of calories in peanut butter included the use of commercially available cellulose, such as AVICEL.RTM. microcrystalline cellulose, as a noncalorie bulking agent. Such commercially available cellulose materials are capable of absorbing considerable quantities of liquid vegetable oil, generally on the order of more than 1.5 grams of oil per gram of cellulose. Because the usual texture (i.e., smoothness, consistency, and mouthfeel) of commercial peanut butters depends in part upon the presence of substantial amounts of liquid peanut oil, the quantities of oil-binding materials that can be used, such as commercially available cellulose materials, are severly restricted. Consequently, only a limited reduction in calories can be obtained in this manner.
Thus, it can be seen that because a reduced calorie peanut butter product must achieve the calorie reduction without substantially altering the textural and flavor attributes of a peanut butter product, attempts to develop a method for significantly reducing calories in peanut butter products have been unsuccessful to date.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a reduced calorie peanut butter product.
It is another object of this invention to provide a reduced calorie peanut butter product that does not substantially alter the textural and flavor attributes of a typical commercial peanut butter.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a reduced calorie peanut butter product by adding non- or low-calorie solid bulking agents to a peanut butter, peanut spread, or imitation peanut butter.